“Like the meat man auction?” she asked, echoing my words from earlier.
“Exactly,” I said.
But before I’d just been worried that Four wasn’t being taken care of. That he was being ridden into the ground or not being fed enough. I’d never really thought that maybe he was heading for slaughter but now it was all I could think about.
“I made it worse for you,” Hanna said, looking sad.
“No, it’s okay,” I told her. “It’s good to have someone to talk to.”
“Yes,” she said. “It is.”
And I realized that even though she had Esther, she probably didn’t have any friends over here or anyone her own age to talk to and I couldn’t imagine why I’d ever been mean to her in the first place.
CHAPTER FORTY SEVEN
Just before the last class, it started to rain again.
“Oh, no,” Andy said as the sun disappeared and thunder rumbled in the distance.
“Maybe they’ll cancel the class?” Rose said.
But after that one rumble of thunder there was only rain and no one was going to cancel the show for rain when we’d come this far.
“You guys will be fine,” Duncan said as we all huddled by our stalls.
“This weather is crazy,” Hanna said. “Is it always this way?”
“Florida weather is crazy,” I told her. “Especially in the summer.”
She didn’t look amused. The horses weren’t either. Bluebird didn’t want to come out of his stall and jump in the rain and he let me know by pinning his ears and planting his feet.
“Come on,” I told him. “It will be fun.”
“Who are you kidding?” Rose said as she walked past. “It will be fun? Fat chance of that.”
“Maybe the rain will stop before we have to ride,” I said, trying to sound hopeful.
Only the rain didn’t stop. It got worse. People were grumbling about it but that didn’t help. The organizers said that the show must go on. There was only one more class to go. We had to suck it up.
“Get in, get round and get out,” Duncan said. “We’ll worry about the jump off if we make it through.”
“Well I won’t make it through,” Andy said.
“You don’t know that,” I said. “Look on the bright side.”
“What bright side?” he said.
He was right. The rain was coming down in sheets. It was hard to even see the ring let alone consider jumping in it but that was what we were going to have to do. I tried to push my nerves down and not think about horses slipping, falling in the mud, poles scattering everywhere. Before I never would have believed that such a thing could happen but now I knew it could happen even on a sunny day. I also knew that Bluebird had my back. He may not have wanted to go out in the rain but I knew that he would do it because I asked him to.
We slogged out to the warm up ring, rain running down the collar of my coat. My feet were wet and so was my underwear. The rain was going sideways and I felt like I needed windscreen wipers on my eyeballs. The footing was deteriorating quickly. After the earlier rain and the multitude of horses who had cantered over it, there were deep puddles forming in the corners and it had gone from wet but okay to deep and sticky.
“I don’t like this,” Rose said as she sat shivering on Noelle.
I didn’t like it either. I was worried about Bluebird, not about him falling so much as getting stuck in the footing and hurting himself. Tendons and ligaments were fragile things and we asked our horses to propel their thousand pound bodies over fences from thin legs and small hooves. It wasn’t ideal on a perfect day but on a day like this? Somehow it felt like suicide.
Duncan was over by the fence talking to Esther, both standing under a big umbrella and relatively dry. It was easy for them to call out instructions to us when they didn’t have water in every orifice.
We walked our horses around on loose reins, everyone except for Andy. Mousse was too busy jumping the puddles. There was no way they were going to make it round the course intact.
I walked Bluebird over to the fence. The words were stuck in my throat. The ones I should have said to Walter but couldn’t find the nerve to. But this was Bluebird. My heart pony. My everything. I had to find my voice for him. I had to put him first.
“I can’t do this,” I said over the sound of the rain.
CHAPTER FORTY EIGHT
If I didn’t ride, then the whole team would be out of the running. I knew that but I also knew that I had to put my pony first. Jumping him in the mud was one thing. He was game for that. What he wasn’t game for was jumping in the torrential downpour that was now taking place.
I’d looked over to the ring. I’d seen the slop that now filled the perfect take off spots and the puddles on the landing sides of the jumps. Sure my pony might get around okay but there was also a good chance that he wouldn’t and I couldn’t take that risk. I wouldn’t take it even if they were dangling an Olympic medal in front of my face instead of a fake gold cup. I’d learned my lesson. Grace had taught me that and I wasn’t going to forget it any time soon.
“I can’t ride,” I said again, this time my voice stronger. “I won’t risk Bluebird. He could slip and fall or pull something. I won’t risk laming him just for a team cup.”
“If you don’t ride, the team is out,” Duncan said, looking up at me as I sat on the back of my pony, both of us drenched to the bone.
“I know,” I said. “And I’m sorry.”
Andy, Rose and Hanna walked their horses over to where Bluebird was standing by the fence.
“Emily is quitting,” Duncan told them, his face flat. “She says that she can’t ride in this.”
“It’s not that I can’t ride,” I said. “It’s that I don’t think it’s safe. The footing is bad. The take-off spots have been ruined. I won’t lame my pony for a cup.”
They looked at me with shocked faces. I was the one who would ride any horse, any time, any place. I wasn’t the person who would just quit because the weather was bad but I guess maybe now I was, if there was a good reason to quit.
Rose was the first to speak up. “I don’t want to ride either,” she said, patting her mare on the neck. “My sister already has a chronically lame horse at home. I don’t want one too.”
“Well if Rose isn’t riding then neither am I,” Andy said.
Duncan looked at Hanna. She was the weak link. The new member of the team and Esther was staring at her. I couldn’t tell if she thought we were being smart or stupid.
“I’m with them,” Hanna finally said with a shrug.
“Alright then,” Duncan said. “A team rebellion it is. I’ll let them know we aren’t going to compete.”
He started to walk away and my heart sank. I’d disappointed him. I was the one who threw in the towel first. Who said that I wouldn’t ride. Duncan had been kind to me. He’d helped me when I couldn’t help myself and now I’d gone and let him down. I wanted to call after him that I was sorry but I knew it wouldn’t help. Tears formed in the back of my eyes but I knew that I couldn’t cry. Esther was there. I couldn’t let her see me fall apart. I blinked a bunch of times but one tear still managed to fall from my watery eyes. It ran down my face, mingling with the rain. I don’t think anyone saw.
And just as I was thinking that I’d never be asked to ride on a team again, Duncan turned around and walked back to me with a smile.
“Well done,” he said, putting his hand on my knee. “Well done.”
“What?” I said.
I was so confused. First he was mad at me and now he was congratulating me?
“I was going to pull the team anyway. You think I’d let you guys risk your lives and your horse’s soundness?”
“I...Well… I don’t know,” I stuttered. “Was this a test then?”
“I’m not sure,” he said, frowning for a second. “But if it was, you passed with flying colors.”
CHAPTER FORTY NINE
Relief washed over me like the rain that was
running down my back. Duncan wasn’t like Walter and I should have known that he would never put us or our horses in harm’s way but he’d still given me the opportunity to prove myself and to learn the lesson that I hadn’t before. That sometimes you had to stand up to people in authority like trainers, people you looked up to who were older than you and knew more than you did. None of that mattered if you got the feeling in your gut that something was wrong. That it was a bad decision to go ahead and do something just because someone told you to.
“Let’s get out of this rain if we’re not riding then,” Andy said.
Mousse pinned his ears and kicked out at Noelle.
“Yes let’s go back to the barn before your horse has another hissy fit like a little baby,” Rose told him but she was smiling.
We all were. No one was mad that I’d been the first one to quit, instead they were all just glad to put their horses away and get dry. We passed towels around, drying off both ourselves and our horses. I only wished I had dry clothes to change into.
Duncan came back from the steward’s tent with good news. We weren’t the only team to pull out over concerns about the footing and in the end they decided to cancel the rest of the show. That was the good news. The bad news was that they weren’t going to reschedule so we would finish on our current score, which was second.
“No trip to Paris,” Rose said, shaking her head. “I knew it was too good to be true.”
“I can’t speak French anyway,” I said, trying to hide my disappointment. “And Jess would have been furious if we all got to go and she didn’t.”
“Why do you care what she thinks?” Andy said.
I just shrugged. I wasn’t really sure but I did know that an angry Jess was one who retaliated and struck out like a snake and since I now lived next door to her, I wasn’t too keen to have her plotting something horrible against me or my horses.
Esther came up to me while I was packing Bluebird’s stuff away, trying to dry it all off before I put it in the tack trunk even though that was a futile exercise. Everything was so rain soaked that it would take days to dry out.
“You did good today,” she said softly.
“Thanks,” I said. “Bluebird was amazing.”
“Yes he was,” she said. “But I’m talking about you. Pulling out? Putting your pony first? That is being a true horseman.”
“You wouldn’t be saying that if you knew everything,” I said, standing up and wiping my hands on my dirty breeches.
I had wanted to tell Esther about Grace and Walter but I was afraid that she would be disappointed in me. Now I knew that was silly but I still couldn’t find the words. I stood there awkwardly, the sound of the rain drowning out my thoughts.
“I do know everything,” she said. “Duncan told me. It wasn’t your fault.”
She pulled me into a hug and I started to cry. I thought I was over it but apparently some scars took longer to heal than others. I’d probably be carrying this one around for a while but if it made me a better horsewoman then I didn’t really care. I knew that the others thought I should be over it by now but it hadn’t happened to them and until it did, until a horse they were riding had a career ending injury and was almost put to sleep then they couldn’t ever know what I’d gone through.
Esther didn’t hold me tight for long. I guess the feeling was as new and foreign to her as it was to me. She just sort of ended up pushing me away and slapping me on the back. I wiped my tears away and grinned. That was more like the Esther I knew and loved.
And so we packed up and went back to Duncan’s farm where the rain finally stopped and the sun came out.
“Should we go back?” Andy said.
“Okay,” Duncan replied but he was laughing.
Today it was okay that we hadn’t won. The sun had come out. Our horses were sound. And that was good enough for me.
CHAPTER FIFTY
Dad came to pick me up with the trailer and I said goodbye to my team mates, feeling kind of sad. I didn’t know if we’d still be a team after today. Maybe Duncan would form a new team now that the championships were over? Perhaps we wouldn’t even be on it. And even though we’d see each other at shows, I knew that it wouldn’t be the same thing. It turned out that I liked being on a team more than I ever thought I would.
“Thanks for everything,” I told Duncan as we stood at the entrance to his barn.
“You say that like you’re not going to see me again,” he said.
“Am I?” I asked.
“I told you, Emily Dickenson,” he replied. “I have big things in store for you. Today was just a bump in the road. You’ll get there.”
I wasn’t sure exactly where there was or how I was going to get there but I guess I had to trust Duncan and I did, after all he had me and my pony’s best interests at heart and that was more important to me than anything.
“Ready to go?” Dad said.
“Yes,” I replied as I waved goodbye to Hanna.
I promised that I’d see her tomorrow and I knew that I would. Now that we’d got to know each other a little better I was pretty sure that we would become really good friends.
“Wait,” I said as Dad drove down the drive and turned left instead of right. “Where are we going? Home is that way.”
“We’re going to get the horse that belongs to you,” he said. “Right?”
“Right.” I nodded.
I thought that Dad had forgotten or that he wouldn’t want to go and rescue Four. We could hardly afford to feed all the mouths we had at the moment but Dad had to know that I’d never just let Four go, his fate uncertain. It would haunt me forever. I had to track him down and I had to get him back and apparently this time my father was going to help.
CHAPTER FIFTY ONE
The drive to the farm was pretty quiet. I sat shivering in my wet clothes but didn’t complain. I knew that I wouldn’t get a second chance to rescue my horse. Dad wouldn’t drive all the way out here again. If we didn’t get him now, then I’d never get him back.
I thought about Dakota and how she’d just vanished. I wondered if she was okay. Her father had died, I was sure of that now. There would be no other reason for her to just disappear and abandon my horse but why hadn’t she called me? I would have gone to get him in a heartbeat. Maybe Missy had talked her out of it. I still didn’t trust the woman I had once been so close to. That was why I guarded my heart now. The reason I couldn’t fully open up to Esther. It was like I was waiting for the other shoe to drop because it always did. Bad things happening for no good reason at all.
I tried to imagine good things instead. Four standing in a deeply bedded stall while a little girl fussed over him and fed him carrots. If he had a good home now, would I really yank him away from that? But the other things I imagined weren’t so good. Dirty stalls or no stalls at all. Moldy grain and no hay and people with whips and spurs. A shiver ran down my spine.
“You okay?” Dad said.
“I will be,” I replied. “When we get Four back.”
CHAPTER FIFTY TWO
The directions led us to a dirt road that was basically a muddy lake with giant holes full of water in it thanks to all the rain. Dad pulled off to the side on the grass but he only made it a few feet before low hanging branches stopped our progress.
“I can’t get the trailer down there,” he said.
“I’ll walk,” I replied, already opening the truck door.
“Wait,” Dad said. “Just a minute. I can’t let you walk down there alone.”
“Sure you can,” I said. “Mom wouldn’t care.”
He looked at me, his brow wrinkled. “Well I’m here and I care,” he said. “I’ll go.”
“Someone has to stay with Bluebird,” I said. “We can’t leave him in the back of the trailer all alone and you hardly even know Four. Would you recognize him if you saw him?”
“Yes,” Dad said then shrugged. “Maybe.”
“See,” I said. “I have to go.”
“And if
he’s there?” Dad said. “How are you going to make them give him to you? Threaten to punch them? That would be like a fly trying to get the attention of an elephant.”
“Thanks a lot Dad,” I said. “I have muscles.” I flexed my arm. “I could take them.”
“No one is taking on anybody,” Dad said. “And I’m not going to let you go down there alone.”
“Well I’m not leaving my pony by himself so what do you want to do about it?” I said.
In the end I pulled my tired and dirty pony out of the trailer and tacked him up. He looked at me like I was crazy. I felt crazy. What kind of a person rode their show pony down a muddy dirt road not even knowing what they were going to find at the end of it? What if there were people who had guns or dogs with big teeth? But there was something that worried me more than all that. What if Four wasn’t there at all?
CHAPTER FIFTY THREE
My pony was fresh. It was like he hadn’t even been to a show. He pranced his way down the road, jumping over the puddles and generally being a silly pony but I couldn’t help but smile. I was happy that he was happy. And I was glad that I’d stood up for him and what was right for all the horses.
Dad kept out of the way of my mud splashing pony, his hands in his pockets and a frown on his face. I knew that he was worried. Walking onto someone’s farm and demanding a horse back wasn’t exactly the best situation to be in, especially since the people could turn out to be criminals like the guy who bought Wizard or even worse, they may just be ordinary people who bought him not even knowing that Dakota had no right to sell him in the first place.
At the end of the road was a gate but it wasn’t closed. It was half open and leaning on broken hinges.
“Not a good sign,” Dad said. “Are you sure that Mickey got the right place?”
Two Strides (Show Jumping Dreams ~ Book 30) Page 10
